EDIT APR. 23rd, 2014: Long overdue, but NEW PROGRESS THREAD HERE
So, okay, I told myself I'd stay quiet about this until I was more confident that I'd actually get it finished, but... I dunno, I guess I feel satisfied enough with my current progress that I feel comfortable talking about it now.
So, here is my current project - Wonderland Adventures: Hidden Realms!
This project is essentially WSW's story, if it took place after the events of the WA trilogy (and WSW hadn't happened beforehand). I would say "remake", but that wouldn't be entirely accurate (the basic story is the same, that's about it), and "retelling"... well, I guess it's accurate... Saying that, however, the story is going to be a bit more expansive than WSW's.
This is going to basically be a full-on mod, running on the Adventures 3 engine.
By "mod", I don't mean that this is just an adventure/hub package - the GUI has gotten a visual alteration (and cleanup), as have various in-game visuals (model textures, level-textures, items, etc.). Let me put this out there: The reason for the graphical alterations is to set HR apart from WA1/the original WA trilogy, or (in some cases) to eliminate artifacts clinging to textures where they don't belong (these are surprisingly common on the GUI, and I think the in-game buttons). Another thing I've done is change the colours of blue/indigo/purple objects, to be a bit closer to the "real" colour (as opposed to cyan/dark blue/pink).
This project will take full advantage of the WA Engine's graphical and gameplay features (well, I'd say so at any rate).
I don't have any predictions for how many adventures this project will have by the end, or how long it'll be gameplay-wise. Having said that, at the current moment (end of November 2013), it's sitting at 65 Adventures, and clocks in at around 3 hours or so (for me - bearing in mind that I know where everything is and such).
ROUGH PROGRESS GUIDE (ALL PERCENTAGES ARE ESTIMATES):
- CHAPTER 1: |||||||||- (Core chapter finished, side areas unfinished - Overall: 90%)
CHAPTER 2: ||||||||-- (Core chapter finished, side areas unfinished - Overall: 80%)
CHAPTER 3: |||||||||- (Core chapter finished, side areas unfinished - Overall: 90%)
CHAPTER 4: |||||||--- (Core chapter, side areas unfinished (CURRENT FOCUS) - Overall: 70%)
CHAPTER 5: |--------- (Core chapter unfinished, side areas not started on - Overall: 5%)
CHAPTER 6: ---------- (Core chapter, side areas not started on)
CHAPTER 7: ---------- (Core chapter, side areas not started on)
POSTGAME: ---------- (Not started on)
OVERALL PROGRESS: ||||------ - 40%
For that matter, please, do not ask me about testing or helping on this. I appreciate the (well, potential) offer, I really do, but:
The reason I'm designing this solo is because I find it much easier to work on my own. That way, I don't find myself left hanging waiting for someone else's work, or vice versa.
As for testing, I haven't fully laid out the plans for that yet. However, instead of a public beta, I'd rather start off with something a bit more controlled where I can get more focused criticism/bug reports.
Anyways, enough waffling - Picture time! I'll likely bump this thread up every week or every two weeks with a progress update and pictures of some sort, provided I've gotten work done.
These pictures cover the first few adventures in the game, by the way.
The start of the game. Here you can also see (though I've shown pictures of this before, I think) what the altered Hills texture looks like. The arrow and dirt spot in the top-right corner are for testing purposes.
The start of the first adventure - This is very early on compared to where the first adventure is in MoFI, PoTZ, or WA1, as it's meant to introduce some of the more basic elements (I expect just about all of the interest, if any, will be coming from the boards here, who already know how to play WA, but I'm approaching this from the viewpoint of this being a standalone Adventures game, meaning tutorials included). Also shows off the new gem/teleporter textures (you can also see two of the new buttons a bit).
The second adventure, rescuing Wee Stinkers in the forest - Yes, the story is based off of WSW, as in the whole "Wee Stinkers carried away by Storm" thing, but like I said - it'll be expanded on. The first chapter of the game (which does cover quite a few adventures) is the buildup, the main story thread doesn't kick in until the start of Chapter 2. This is intentional, as opposed to a pacing screw-up on my part.
More forest adventures, also showing off a bit more of the revamped cursors (all the ones that the game uses have been edited, I think there are two "dummy" icons in the file that aren't used in the final)
An AskAbout that I threw together mainly for the purpose of understanding how the silly things worked, but I ended up keeping it. As you can probably guess, the Windy Hills from WSW have become the Windy Valley.
An optional forest adventure that can be accessed after finishing the "rescue Wee Stinkers" adventures beforehand.
If you have ANY questions about this, then ask away - I will answer them to the best of my abilities. Same thing for any comments or (preferably constructive) criticisms, go for it!
(Note that even though I was a member of the QA team for PoTZ, I'm going to attempt to refrain from posting any major spoilers for either the game's story or the gameplay elements - Once people have reached the last section of the game, I might start being a bit more open about things)
EDIT NOV. 26th: Added rough progress guide thing, for the curious. Will update whenever I get around to a picture update.
EDIT DEC. 26th: Updated progress guide.